Radioactive
by Bittersweet Dances
Summary: This is it, the apocalypse. In the wake of nuclear war, Sakura searches for a sense normalcy in the fallout of nuclear winter.
1. Prologue

It was cold.

That was all she could think of to describe the barren wasteland that once was covered in luscious foliage. All that remains is the fallout from the nuclear war that ravaged the world.

If this is the apocalypse, she isn't sure what will make life begin again.

Her worn leather boots were scuffed and covered in dust, as she put one foot in front of the other, unsure of where her destination was or where she was going.

All she knew was that she needed to find a sign of life.

Her clothes were threadbare, faded from the harsh, heatless sun beating down on her. The world had entered a nuclear winter, and no one was entirely sure of what to do. Maybe the nuclear shelters had been a good idea, when the terrorist cell of Akatsuki lit up a missile, and every nation had retaliated by launching their own.

Either way, she was alone, and if she wasn't armed to the teeth with an AK slung across her back with a pistol on her hip, the world would be a dangerous place for a young girl like herself.

The bag she carried is stuffed full of iodine pills and radiation medicine she had taken from the vault when she left, ready to see the sun for the first time in years.

Maybe it wasn't a good decision, but it was too late to go back.

Her breath fans out in front of her, the temperature nearly frozen in the middle of August.

This is it. The apocalypse.

The animals that survived the nuclear fallout have become vicious and mutated, and the axe at her side had saved her life countless times since she left the vault in search of something, anything.

Hours later she can see it on the horizon. The peaks of skyscrapers, the first sign of life as she once knew it since she left the vault. She nearly drops her bag on the ground in relief, knowing that with the city came resources, despite how irradiated it may be.

There was enough medicine in that bag to last her a year. Maybe there would be more in the city.

Heaving a sigh, she continued on, one foot in front of the other, her green eyes fixed on the city on the horizon.

The apocalypse had come full force, and she was ready to face the fallout.

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**AN: New story. We'll see where this goes. Inspired by the Fallout video game series and Radioactive by Imagine Dragons.**


	2. One

The suburbs surrounding the city were silent and deserted, as expected. She shouldered her pack over her AK, brushing the pink strands out of her face and green eyes.

The sun was setting, and Sakura crossed to one side of the street to a modestly sized house, pushing open the already open door. The entire place was covered in a thick layer of dust, and she pulled up the bandana around her neck up over her nose and mouth. She grabbed her pistol, holding it firmly in both hands as she traversed through the house.

Her boots thumped across the wooden floor as she searched through the house in an attempt to secure it before bunkering down for the night. Her breath caught when she heard sounds coming from the kitchen, and she tightened her grip on her gun as she turned the corner.

With the scarce light coming in from the window, she saw a giant, hairless dog digging into a pile of food, its breath coming in gasps as it wolfed down its meal. It paused, sniffing. Sakura bit her lip and pointed the gun, aiming down the sight.

The dog turned, its red eyes meeting her green ones, and it growled, its muscles tightening in preparation to leap. Just as it rocked back in order to gather strength into its unnaturally strong hind legs, Sakura squeezed the trigger.

The dog crumpled to the ground, its head blown away by the force of the pistol. Wrinkling her nose, Sakura approached it, grabbing its front legs with gloved hands to pull it out of the house.

She dragged it across the tile floor, out of the house before shutting the door of the house behind her, locking it. Returning to the kitchen, she reached into her back pocket to grab her Geiger counter. She picked up a can of beans, waving the device over it to ascertain its level of radioactivity.

Overall, it was a relatively low count, and she rifled through the drawers to find a can opener and spoon. Setting her pack on the ground and leaning her AK against the counter, she hopped up onto the counter, opening the can and digging in to eat the cold food.

Her stomach growled savagely from the lack of food she had experienced in the past month since leaving the vault, and she wolfed down the beans as savagely as the dog had been tearing into the food.

After finishing the food, she tossed the can onto the ground and found a bowl in the cabinets. She ran water into the bowl until it was full. Rifling through her pack, she found a RadAway tablet and dropped it into the water. It began bubbling like dry ice in water, and she sighed, staring intently as the tablet slowly dissolved. She drummed her fingers on the counter impatiently, having to wait for the tablet to fully dissolve before she could trust the water to be safe to drink.

Once the tablet had full dissolved, she tipped the bowl to her mouth, greedily drinking the water. One benefit to the nuclear winter was that water was always cold.

Sakura grabbed her things and moved to the living room, where a fireplace was installed with wood remaining in the hearth. She started a fire and settled down in front of it, warming her frozen fingers.

The sun had been down for nearly an hour when she heard gunshots out on the streets. Sakura's heart began pounding, and she quickly grabbed her gun and pack, scurrying out of the living room and into a bedroom. Her breath came in short gasps as she heard the whining of direwolves dying before the gunshots stopped.

Ever since she left the vault, no one she had met had been friendly, but now that she was closer to the city, maybe things would be different?

The door to the house rattled, and Sakura checked the state of her ammunition on her guns. "Looks good." She breathed to herself, just as the front door was kicked in.

_Fuck._

"There's a fire running. Someone's been here." A man's voice said. Steeling herself, she lurched into the living room, pointing her AK directly at the man.

"Put down your weapons and kick them here." She growled, narrowing her eyes. Two men immediately dropped their AKs, their arms flying up.

"Shit, it's girl." One said in wonder. They were both outfitted in some kind of military outfit.

"How does she have that kind of firepower?"

"Must be a rebel."

"Shut up!" Sakura snapped. "Who are you?"

"We're with the military. Identify yourself."

There's a military?

_What the fuck._

The people in the vault had always said that no life remained outside of the vaults, and now she had run into a military?

Lost in her thoughts, she didn't notice one of them reaching behind until it was too late. He whipped a handgun out and pointed at her. Sakura hit the floor just as he fired, and she quickly rolled to the side, firing off a round and nailing one of the men in the head before quickly shooting the other.

"That went well." She muttered, getting to her feet. She crossed the room to the two bodies and began to loot. The first thing she found were RadAway pills along with extra ammo for their AKs.

"Bingo." She murmured to herself, quickly shoving the extra ammo and pills into her bag. "I guess I better get out of here."

With that, she went out into the frigid night, moving towards the city.

Only then did she notice that the city was lit up.

_They have power?_

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**AN: Andddd chapter 1! Please leave reviews :)  
**


	3. Two

As Sakura approached the tall skyscrapers, she was able to pick out what she could only guess was a wall surrounding the entire center of the city. _It's probably to keep the animals out…_She thought, even though she had a feeling that it was there for a different reason.

She came upon it in the dark, and an over-bright spotlight began to make a path towards her. Hands grabbed her by the shoulders and pulled her back behind a fence.

"Are you crazy? They'll gun you down!" A red headed girl muttered, staring at her through the dark frames of her glasses.

"What are you talking about?" Sakura replied, staring at the girl.

"Where are you from?" She asked.

"A vault. I got out of there a month ago and have been looking for some sign of human life and—"

"You came to the wrong place." The girl cut her off solemnly. "They won't let you in. They don't let anyone in." She paused. "Especially someone packing as much heat as you. Is that an AK?"

"Karin, we can just sneak her in." A blonde girl said, dropping down from a roof. "She's a girl. We can't just leave her out here. The direwolves or the military will get her."

"Is that really a good idea?" Karin asked, meeting the blonde girl's blue eyes.

"Hey Forehead, how irradiated are you?" The blonde girl asked. Sakura's eyes narrowed.

"I've been in a vault since the fallout. And I have these." She reached in her pack and withdrew her supply of RadAway.

"Shit, do you realize how hard it is to get a hold of those?" Karin mused aloud.

"Do you not take any of these?" Sakura said.

"We do, but the military hands them out individually." The blonde girl replied. "My name is Ino. You want in to the city?" Sakura nodded in affirmation. "Be prepared to get your hands dirty." Ino paused. "What'd you say your name was?"

"I didn't. It's Sakura."

"Be careful not to be seen. We don't mind you having your guns but the military won't like it." Karin peered over the fence. "Let's go." With that, the redhead and blonde scurried across the street with Sakura following close behind.

"Are we going to climb the fence?" Sakura asked softly.

"Nah, the entire thing is electrified 24/7." Ino replied, turning down a side street.

"Then how are we getting in?"

"They aren't very good at keeping an eye on sewers." Karin smirked, glancing back at Sakura. "Get ready, vault girl, time to get dirty." She pulled a hook out of her bag and stopped over a storm drain. Using the hook, she pried it open, moving the lid off to the side. Meanwhile, Ino rifled through her bag, pulling out a small flashlight.

"Do you have a flashlight in that bag of yours?" Ino asked. Sakura sighed and opened the bag she had taken from the vault.

"Um…yeah. I don't know if it works though." She clicked the button, and it turned on.

"You're going to need that." Karin replied. Ino kneeled down and began climbing the rungs down into the sewer with her flashlight between her teeth. "After you." Karin waved to Sakura.

Taking a deep breath, Sakura clasped the flashlight between her teeth and began climbing down after Ino. Not long after, Karin followed, pulling the sewer lid back on after her. Immediately, they were plunged into darkness beyond the meager light the flashlights provided.

A couple minutes of climbing later, Sakura hit solid ground and stepped back, taking the flashlight in her hands and swinging it in a wide arc around the sewer. It was wide tunnel, and she could see Ino pulling out what looked like a baseball bat from a box left by the ladder.

"Sometimes there are animals down here." She offered, smirking. When Sakura moved to grab her gun, Ino stopped her. "Don't, the sound will reverberate too much. Better to use that axe of yours." Karin dropped to the ground with a thump, and retrieved her hook out of her bag.

"Time to go, vault girl." Karin said.

"It's Sakura."

"Whatever." Karin paused. "Look, it's nothing personal, but we don't need you attracting too much attention once we get out of here and into the city. That AK is too big to hide in a bag."

"It's okay." Sakura murmured, following the two girls down the tunnels. "How do you guys have power here? Even the vaults have a very small supply of power."

"The higher ups managed to get the grid back online after everything went to shit. Probably a nuclear generator over at the lake or something." Ino said. "I'm not sure, Karin was actually here."

"I was in the vault that this city was designated to. We came out after, like, five years, and the military was able to reset some of the land or something and start farming. Pretty soon after that the power came on. No one's really sure how they did it." She glanced back at Sakura, the light from Sakura's flashlight gleaming off of Karin's glasses. "What brings you all the way out here? Why didn't you stay with your vault?"

"My vault isn't open." Sakura muttered.

"What?" Ino said incredulously. "How did you get out if it isn't open?"

"I opened it myself…just enough for me to slip out before they caught on and closed it behind me." Sakure replied.

"Why'd you leave?" Karin questioned.

"Overseers were dicks. Rations were shit. Power was spotty. I figured I could just take my chances out here. I stole some RadAway and the handgun and got out as fast as I could." Sakura rested a hand on her pistol.

"Well I can't say you made a great choice. Everything's shit out there. But you could make a life here. Live it up. They say we only got forty years to live out here, what with the radiation." Karin offered. "I guess I'm down to thirty."

"How old were you when it happened?" Sakura asked.

"I think…three? I don't know, my first memory is of the vault. My brother actually remembers things though, before the bombs went off." She paused. "Apparently there were like seven billion people in the world or some crazy number like that. Hard to believe, huh?"

Sakura nodded absent-mindedly, thinking of that day. She'd been five years old when the sirens started blaring, when her parents had grabbed her from her room and carried her to the car and driven the twenty miles to the vault.

She remembered being separated from them when they closed the vault doors. She remembered the deafening bang as the missile hit. She remembered the heat wave and she remembered the panic.

Fifteen years later, emerging from the vault illustrated just how bad things were. The bitter cold. The sun beating down through the haze. The feel of the tingling when she passed by the remains of a warhead.

"Here we are." Karin said, standing at another ladder. Ino set down her bat in another box by the ladder. "You should leave the AK here. No way you'll get a block in the city before it gets noticed. Just put the axe and hand gun in your bag." Biting her lip, Sakura dropped the AK in the box with Ino's bat.

"I like you, Sakura." Ino said, meeting her eyes. "You can stay with us while you learn your way around the city."

"I know a guy that can get you some papers, make you exist in the walls of the city." Karin offered.

"Yeah, thanks." Sakura replied, shoving her hand gun in her bag and setting the axe in the box while Ino began climbing upwards. When Sakura moved to follow Ino, Karin stopped her.

"Let me go first. I want to see your face when you get a look at the city."

As Karin began the ascent up the ladder, Sakura shuffled her feet anxiously, picking at the threads on her shirt. Once Karin had climbed far enough ahead, Sakura reached up for a rung on the ladder.

One rung, another. She could feel nervous sweat gather on her forehead in anticipation. When she was close, Karin reached down for her hand. Sakura took it, and the other girl pulled her up.

Sakura's breath caught. The streets were lit up, even at this hour of the night, and multicolored lights flashed from within buildings lining the streets. People walked the sidewalks, some staggering.

"Welcome to Konoha."

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**AN: And here begins the main arc of the story :) Please leave reviews :D**


	4. Three

The sheer magnitude of the lights was overwhelming to Sakura, after years of living in dimly lit, underground rooms and then traversing through the barren wasteland with the sun barely peaking through the dust-clouded skies. "It's amazing." She said in wonder, spinning in a circle.

"Come on, you have to get off the streets before the military asks for your papers." Karin said, grabbing Sakura's wrist. Sakura nodded, following the two girls down the street and into a back alley.

"You can stay with us while you get on your feet." Ino offered, leading the way down side streets.

"Thanks so much." Sakura said sincerely.

"Welcome to your life. Hope you enjoy your stay." Karin said, jogging ahead of Ino to a door. She pulled a card out of her back pocket and waved it over a sensor at the door. It beeped, and Karin pushed it open. Sakura followed her and Ino into the building, which open up into a lobby with a front desk and elevator to the right.

Ino clicked the up button on the elevator and crossed her arms, waiting for the elevator to arrive. "So you've been in the vault all this time?" She asked.

"Yeah. There were a thousand people initially in the vault when it closed." Sakura replied, playing adjusting her bag around her shoulders.

"So few people." Karin said, pushing her glasses up higher on her nose.

"Yeah…they were supposed to let at least twice that in, but because it took so long for people to take the sirens seriously, they closed it early. Cry wolf and stuff, y'know?"

"Mm." Ino hummed. The elevator dinged and the doors slid open. Karin waved the card in front of the sensor and pushed the number four button. The elevator started with a jolt, ascending the floors rapidly. It ground to a halt, and the doors opened. Sakura followed the two girls, her boots clicking on the tile floor. Karin flashed the card in front of another sensor at a door, number 402, and opened the door.

"Luckily, one of our roommates just moved out to live with her boyfriend, so you can stay in that room." Ino said, waving in the general direction of what Sakura assumed was a bedroom. The front door had led to a meager kitchen with what looked like steel appliances. Wooden floors adorned the apartment, and the kitchen looked out into the living room, with a couch and armchair with a TV mounted on the wall.

"You guys have TV?" Sakura asked in amazement.

"Sort of. It's mostly movies from before. Mostly it's news, military announcements, video games, that kind of stuff. It came with the apartment." Karin replied. She took a seat on the couch, grabbing a laptop, and opened it.

"I'll need some of your personal info so I can get you some papers." Karin said, clicking at the computer. Meanwhile, Sakura wandered through the apartment and into the bathroom, where the light clicked on automatically when she entered. It was there that she got the first good look at herself since she left the vault.

Her face was smudged with dirt, and her hair hung limply to her collarbones, covered in a layer of dust. The goggles she had used to shade herself from the fierce winds that kicked up an absurd amount of dirt were coated with it on top of her head. Her brown leather jacket was faded and worn from the month of trekking through the barren wasteland, fighting off mutated animals and withstanding the elements.

"Get cleaned up so we can get your picture taken so you can have an ID." Ino called. She appeared in the doorway, handing Sakura some clothes. "You should be able to fit into this, and then we can get this business taken care of."

"Thanks," Sakura said. Ino pulled the door closed as she left, and Sakura wandered over to the shower. When she turned the tap, the water instantly turned on in a thick stream, with steam rising from it. She stared in wonder, for the water in the vault had been barely a weak lukewarm trickle.

She showered quickly, relishing the hot water and using the shampoo and conditioner to properly wash her hair for the first time in a long time. She toweled off and pulled on the clothes Ino had given her, a short, navy skirt and cream colored tank top.

Upon exiting the bathroom, Karin waved her over to wear she sat on the couch with her laptop. "Here, fill this out so I can get your ID made."

The form consisted of standard information, age, date of birth, height, weight, the kinds of things that once went on the driver's licenses before the war. Karin then stood her in front of a blue sheet that she had hung up on the wall. "Smile." Karin said and then took a picture.

"Alright, we should be able to get the ID tomorrow or the next day. Ino will take you clothes shopping, and you can pay her back when you get a job." Karin cocked an eyebrow. "You _are _getting a job, right?"

"Of course. I don't know what I'm qualified for though…" Sakura trailed off, staring down at her feet.

"Doesn't matter. Pretty face like you will at least get a waitressing job or something." Ino said from where she stood in the doorway to a bedroom. "Let's get some sleep, and I'll show you around tomorrow."


End file.
